


Our Songs

by Jubalii



Category: Coco (2017)
Genre: 5 Song Challenge, All Fics Less Than 3000 Words, Based off Discord, F/M, Gen, Oneshot collection, various topics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-09-02 03:44:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16778947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jubalii/pseuds/Jubalii
Summary: The rhythm of a moment can be described in a song....5 Song Challenge: Coco EditionBasically I put my playlist on shuffle, and wrote a oneshot for each of the first five songs. For an extra challenge, none of them can exceed 3,000 words.





	Our Songs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 1/Song 1: Your Wildest Dreams by The Moody Blues  
> (song link at end of fic)

“ _Oye,_ Imelda.”

“Hmm?” Imelda didn’t bother looking up, deftly folding the washcloth in her hands before placing it neatly on the quickly growing stack. Everyone in the house went through enough linens that washing was a biweekly chore, even before Héctor’s return. With Rosita gone with Julio to visit their parents in a northern district of the Land of the Dead, it fell back upon her to keep up with the steady flow pouring each day into the laundry baskets.

“Back already from the plaza? It’s hardly midafternoon.” She listened as he moved behind her, a phantom brush of air that lifted the edge of her skirts. His guitar found its place in the corner with a thunk, the strings twanging in protest. She heard him slide the chair from beneath her vanity mirror, the cushion wheezing softly as he took a seat.

He didn’t answer, the silence stretching comfortably between them as she continued to work. She kept her attention on him, folding robotically until there was a small mountain of white striped washcloths, primed for the linen closet. She placed them carefully back in the laundry basket before moving on to the towels, snapping them sharply in the crisp breeze before fighting the thick cloth into neat oblong squares.

Feeling eyes on her, she glanced over her shoulder to see Héctor sitting backwards on the wrought iron chair; his chin rested on his arms, an undefinable look on his face as he watched her work. She smiled, a warmth growing behind her breastbone at how engrossed he seemed to be. Was the sight of his wife doing mundane chores really so interesting?

“Not many listeners today?” she asked, trying again to create conversation. “The plaza must have been empty, if you’re back so early.” It was no secret between them that he’d fallen back onto earlier habits, wandering out to the local plaza to play for free and talk to the people that kept shop there. A part of her did wonder if he thought they needed a break from his constant presence—perhaps he was the one that needed a break from _them._ Or maybe he’d just grown used to being beneath an open sky, and the shop made him feel confined.

She would have loved to know the answer, but it was hard to ask questions when she could never find the right words to say them in. Much of it felt like prying, meddling in his personal affairs. He’d only been home—if he indeed called this place home—for a single winter; now that the balmy spring air drew people from their houses he was out more often than in.

“It was alright.” She waited for him to go on, to tell her one of his usual stories about the day: a fancy new _alebrije,_ a strangely dressed person, even just _chisme_ on the locals. Instead he paused, the absence of sound lingering uncertainly between them. “Imelda, can I… can I ask you something?”

“W—of course you can,” she replied, a jolt of nervous energy zipping down her spine at his seriousness. It wasn’t a tone she was used to hearing from her normally upbeat husband. She cleared her throat as she turned, clutching an unfolded towel to her bodice and attempting another smile. “You can ask me anything,” she assured him, hoping he didn’t notice the way her voice wavered. Their eyes met and he lifted his head, shoulders squared and fingers intertwined in the iron curls of her chair. 

“Do you ever think about me?” he asked, causing her to blink in confusion. “Did you,” he corrected himself quietly, browbone narrowing in his own puzzlement. _What does that question mean?_ She gripped the towel tighter, muffling the rapid phantom heartbeat only she could hear.

“What are you talking about?” she chuckled—or tried to, the sound rippling with unease. “You’re here; it’s impossible _not_ to think about you.”

“I meant… before, I guess.” He waved his hand not just at her but at the room, the house. “Before any of this.”

“Before—” She slowly inclined her head, trying to avert her eyes, but something in his gaze kept her from being able to look away. “Before I died.” He nodded silently, his expression loose and impassive. How was she supposed to answer a question like that?!

 _With the truth,_ her mind supplied. Hurriedly she turned, putting her back as a barrier between her and his solemn eyes. _You ought to think he knew already_ , she fussed to herself, shoulders aching as she hunched over the towel. She meant to fold it, to go on with her work, but her fingers refused to obey and instead tightened further in the sun-warmed fabric.

“How could I not?” She stiffened, surprised that her mouth was moving, that she’d said it aloud instead of in the safety of her head. Her jaw clenched, trying to stop the flow of words long enough to think about what was being said, but it was too late. The dam—one she hadn’t known existed in the first place—had burst.

“You were in every song I heard.” She cringed from her own watery voice, but thankfully no tears spilled from her eyes. _Why should they? I cried them all years ago._ “Every note of music, guitar just out of sight; I would hear a laugh, a _grito_ , and even though I knew it wasn’t you I couldn’t help but think that maybe… maybe this once I’d be wrong—” She shook her head, sighing. “I couldn’t escape you, even in my dreams.”

“You… dreamt of me?” She heard him stand and bent lower, nearly hiding her face in the towel. She didn’t want him to see her this way, not when they’d been doing so _well_.

“Sometimes I would be angry,” she confessed, whispering. “Mostly I was glad that you’d come back to me—to us. That Coco wouldn’t have to look out at the horizon anymore the way she used to. Even as an adult I’d catch her doing it. Some small part of her was still waiting, long after I’d given up.”

“Imelda.”

“Finally I knew that if you weren’t dead, you would be soon enough; you were as old as I was, after all, and who knew what sort of life you’d been living out there.” _No life at all, not even a chance at one—_ “I tried to tell myself I didn’t care whether you were alive or not, but that… that was a lie.” She felt him standing behind her, muscles she no longer had tightening as she waited for him to move, to speak, _something_. “I really did try to forget you, Héctor.” Her one true shortcoming, the failure that, until recently, she’d never been able to forgive herself for. “I tried my hardest but… I couldn’t.”

“I’m sorry.” Her head turned when she heard him move, the soft tap of Rivera boots on hardwood. He paused, his form blurry in the corner of her eye; one arm had been reaching out to her, but instead fell to hang limply at his side. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She swallowed, breath sticking in her throat. “They were good dreams. I wasn’t unhappy… or if I was, it was never for long.” She laughed weakly. “You always did have a way of talking yourself out of trouble, even if it was only a dream.” He echoed her laugh, the sound croaking out of him as he gripped his wrist tightly.

“I guess I must have been pretty good, huh?” She couldn’t help but smile, bittersweet with the memories of countless dreams.

“You weren’t bad, _músico._ ” Another soft laugh shook her frame as she looked down at the towel, fingers tracing the pale pattern stitched across the edge. “Sometimes you didn’t have to say a word; you’d just watch me as I shouted myself hoarse, and then you’d… you’d put your arms around me and—”

His arms _did_ go around her without warning, breaking her train of thought with a startled gasp as his hands trapped hers against the towel. He gently drew her into the cradle of his arms, pressing her to his firm, yet somehow yielding ribcage. She froze, relaxing slowly as his cheek found a resting place in the soft pillow of her hair.

“Like this?” 

“Sometimes….” Of all the days not to wear a shawl! She shifted, feeling his sternum against the top of her spine through the low cut of her daytime dress. It was comforting, intimacy without the added pressure of sensuality. His fingers traced over hers, cupping her tiny hands in his palms before letting out a soft exhale.

“I missed holding you like this,” he murmured, the edge of his mouth catching strands of hair and pulling it from the twist. “You know I thought of you, too.” He hadn’t had to say it; she knew it well enough. Yet, at the same time, the acknowledgment settled an anxious fluttering in her stomach.

“Yes… you’d always say something like that, too. Charmer.” He made a little grunt, a protest, but she ignored it and continued, “And all the while, you’d be giving me that _look_.” Now she was let go, gently spun until the towel was all that separated his bared ribs from her bodice. He studied her face, bemused.

“What look?”

“That… that _look_.” His browbone rose, stretching the contours of his already ridiculous cheekbones. “I don’t know what it is, what it’s supposed to mean,” she argued, feeling vaguely silly at the thought of being unable to decipher the expression floating in her mind’s eye. “It’s just a face you make, sometimes.”

“Oh really?” His mouth twisted in a wry grin, and before she knew it the _look_ was staring her full in the face. “Which one?”

“That one!” The towel dropped to her feet, but she had much more to worry about. Unable to stop herself, her hands rose to cover his twinkling eyes, trying futilely to keep him from seeing her embarrassment. He laughed again, a real laugh that seemed to echo from his stomach and vibrate against her palms. “That goofy face you make, all the time; I never knew what it meant!”

“This face?” he repeated, prying her hands away and holding them tightly in his own. She blushed harder, feeling that he somehow knew despite no physical indication of how red her cheeks felt.

“ _S_ _í_ , that face.” At least he wasn’t making her nervous with his seriousness anymore; instead, he was content to fluster her with endless teasing. _At least some things really don’t change._

“That’s simple: it means….” He tugged her forward, his lips brushing the design on her cheek before finding the place where her ear used to be. “ _Me encanta Imelda_.”

“¡ _Ay_!” She pulled away, her hands slipping from his and face on fire from roots to collarbone. “Can’t you stop for five minutes?” she scolded, knowing all the while that he’d been just as serious as before.

He smiled placatingly at her, opening his arms as his head tilted in a boyish, questioning manner. Somehow the gesture had survived over a century of existence, melting what little annoyance she had at both him, and herself. She stepped back into his embrace, refusing to look him in the eye as her hands smoothed over the intricate threads of his newest charro suit. The months had been good to him, and he looked a little _too_ handsome with his hair neatly combed and his skull markings glowing brighter each day.

“Did I ever kiss you, in your dreams?” He drew her closer, resting his forehead against hers. She shivered, nodding.

“Always.” Her arms wound around his neck, heels lifting off the ground to help close the distance. He kissed her lazily, smiling in triumph when she melted into him with a sigh.

“Like that?”

“Harder,” she mumbled, the words falling clumsily against his mouth. “Like you missed me.”

“I did.” He obliged, sweeping her off her feet entirely as he yanked her flush against his chest. She trembled in his arms, skirts tangling in her legs as her boots scrambled to find some kind of purchase. He laughed into the kiss, squeezing her tightly before twirling her and nearly upsetting the laundry basket.

“Better?” he panted, barely parting long enough to ask and certainly not giving her enough time to answer before claiming her again.

“ _Mmph_! Héctor!”

“ _No es un sueño_.” Her heart ached at the blithe words, filled to overflowing with sadness and love in equal measure. 

“ _Yo s_ _é_.” She rubbed at a purple smudge on the corner of his mouth with her thumb, running her other hand through his hair until he was nearly purring with contentment. “After all, you still don’t have it right,” she couldn’t help but tease in turn, hiding her face against his jacket. He snorted, grinning wildly when she looked up.

“Then I guess we better practice some more. Right?” She glared at him until his smile faltered, taking on a sheepish edge. “R-right?” Her hands tightened on his lapels, absently kicking the towel onto the foot rug before preparing to yank him down with a grin of her own.

“Practice makes perfect.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Moody Blues version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01lm2CWwsqA  
> NSP version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psnptMJDbB8


End file.
